Sunday, December 11, 2005

MALUNS

"Maluns" is an ancestral dish from Grisons (Southeastern Switzerland) that was generally eaten by the mountain people who needed rich and stocky staples in order to be strong enough to face the harsh labor which they had to supply at the farm.

"Maluns" is a simple meal which is very useful to make if you have some leftover potatoes. Apart from being very economical, this dish is also really fine and comforting. At the origin, the farmers didn’t eat "Maluns" with apple sauce, plum or cherry puree like we do now, but they used to dip a spoonful of "Maluns" into their ‘café au lait’!

Quantity for 2-3 people

Ingredients:600g Cooked potatoes, one or two days old200-230g Plain white flour (depending on how wet the potatoes are)2 Tsp Salt (+ more to taste)120g Unsalted butter

Method: 1. Into a bowl, grate the potatoes with a “Rösti” grater or with the larger holes of a normal grater.2. Add the flour and salt. Mix well.3. In a frying pan melt the butter, then add the potatoe mixture and stir well in order to wet the whole mixture with the butter (there should be no dry mixture left).4. Fry very slowly over low heat for about 45 minutes while continously stirring.

Remarks: If you use floury potatoes, you might need more butter.When mixing the flour with the potatoes, be careful to get a flaky mixture; it should not stick together or be moist.Don’t prepare the Maluns mixture in advance, otherwise it will be sticky and it will lose of it’s flakiness.Use an antiadhesive pan to fry.The end product should be soft, look like small pebbles and only slightly fried (not too crispy).

Serving suggestions:Serve with apple sauce (apple puree), plum or cherry puree. You can also eat Maluns with cheese or in the traditional way, with ‘café au lait’.

8 comments:

I love seeing what new international dish you're up to cooking. You really undertake some amazing things and they always come out looking great. On top of that I love the little anthropological lessons I get from reading the posts as well!